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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23822275">The Most Important Thing</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ionaperidot/pseuds/Ionaperidot'>Ionaperidot</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Batman - All Media Types, Under the Red Hood</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Bruce Wayne is a Good Parent, Gen, Jason Todd is Red Hood, Tim and Cass and Babs and Alfred are around, but i don't want to clog up their character tags because they play pretty minor roles</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 16:16:12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,486</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23822275</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ionaperidot/pseuds/Ionaperidot</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"He pulls off his stupid helmet, and then the domino mask beneath it.</p>
<p>Which is when Dick loses his grip on the support beams and falls, just barely escaping a broken ankle, and his dead baby brother points a gun at his head."</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jason is alive, and the only thing that matters is bringing him home.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>350</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>1011</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Avidreaders Batman completed faves</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s just dumb luck. Things have been so quiet on the crime front, Bruce took Cass and Tim to Hawaii for spring break. He’d tried to talk Dick into coming, but Dick has a real job; he can’t just drop everything for the whims of a billionaire.</p>
<p>And his real job currently has him undercover as a drug dealer. Which is where the luck comes in, when some kid in a stupid helmet drops in on a routine meeting and dumps out a duffel bag full of heads on the table.</p>
<p>He focuses on being Dick Grayson, undercover cop, resists the temptation to be Nightwing, and listens to the kid’s speech, in an obviously modified voice through the helmet.</p>
<p>And when the meeting is over, Dick slips out and follows the kid. </p>
<p>He’s got Babs in his ear, of course - so he cheats a little at being a cop. Whatever.</p>
<p>The kid knows there’s not a Bat in Gotham tonight; it came up in his little speech. But Dick’s not a Bat. Not tonight. And he and Babs follow him to a warehouse, where he pulls off his stupid helmet, and then the domino mask beneath it.</p>
<p>Which is when Dick loses his grip on the support beams and falls, just barely escaping a broken ankle, and his dead baby brother points a gun at his head.</p>
<p>Babs is shouting in his ear, a lot of words he bets Jim doesn’t know she knows, and Jason - it’s not Jason, right? It can’t be Jason - turns off the safety, and Dick stands slowly, hands in the air.</p>
<p>“Hey, Jaybird. It’s okay. It’s just me.”</p>
<p>“Nightwing,” he says, even though Dick’s obviously not in the suit. “Fuck.” He doesn’t lower the gun.</p>
<p>Why does Jason even have a gun? It can’t be Jason, right? It can’t be.</p>
<p>“Duffle bag,” Babs says quietly, and, yeah, it definitely isn’t Jason.</p>
<p>“Jay,” he says anyway, just in case, and the kid pulls the trigger.</p>
<p>It grazes him.</p>
<p>Dick stares at the gun. Jason stares at the gun. For a second it looks like he’ll drop it, but then he aims again, and there’s something in the angle of his chin that makes Dick suddenly, impossibly sure he’s Jason.</p>
<p>“I can’t believe you just shot me.”</p>
<p>“Gonna shoot you again.”</p>
<p>This can’t - this can’t - “I’m telling Dad,” Dick says, then grabs Jason’s discarded domino mask and runs.</p>
<p>-</p>
<p>Dick calls his boss to report that he’s both very sick and very contagious, then calls Leslie to have her fax over a doctor’s note (“I know it’s unethical, but it’s literally life and death, please, I’ll even try to throw up when I get home if it makes you feel better.”) He picks up Babs at the clock tower, then tries to call Bruce—it goes straight to voicemail. Tim and Cass, too.</p>
<p>He finds an eyebrow hair on the domino mask, and Alfred helps him run a DNA test while Babs tries to figure out where Jay came from, where he’s been, and how he’s alive.</p>
<p>Dick just keeps seeing severed heads rolling across a table, and the look on his little brother’s face as he prepared to shoot him a second time. He does end up puking; Leslie should be happy.</p>
<p>By morning all the news stations can talk about is the Red Hood. Babs still hasn’t found anything, and Bruce hasn’t called them back. None of them have slept. Alfred makes breakfast. The DNA test confirms it’s really Jason. Dick doesn’t understand what’s happening. Jason is - Jason was - he’s alive, but he’s come back wrong.</p>
<p>Babs finally finds something. An unnamed kid matching Jay’s description, including the injuries he died with, was comatose at a Gotham hospital for two weeks, about six months after his death. She loses the trail again after that, and they give up on that angle, start working backwards from last night instead of forward from his death. </p>
<p>Alfred doesn’t even try to suggest they take a break and get some rest first. Dick thinks he’s been crying. They’ve all been crying. He wishes Bruce would call back. If he doesn’t hear anything in a couple hours he’ll call the hotel.</p>
<p>Turns out the reason it’s been so quiet these last few weeks is Jason, working carefully behind the scenes before his little display last night. He dumps the bodies of three major mob players on the police station steps, and Babs traces him to several locations around the world over the last year. Every time he leaves, he leaves bodies in his wake. Dick throws up again.</p>
<p>Bruce finally calls back.</p>
<p>“Jason’s alive,” Dick tells him.</p>
<p>“What?”</p>
<p>“We ran the DNA. Jason’s alive, and he’s going on some sort of killing spree. We have eleven confirmed dead, and at least three more major players I’ve been trying and failing to track down for the last hour.”</p>
<p>“Don’t engage. I’ll be home as soon as I can.”</p>
<p>-</p>
<p>They still don’t know what happened between comatose Jason’s disappearance from the hospital and when he started killing sex traffickers in Europe. That’s over a year of missing history. </p>
<p>Maybe it isn't Jason. Maybe it’s something else using his body.</p>
<p>Bruce calls again. There’s a huge storm coming in. No one is flying. He could probably pay someone enough to risk it, but it’s dangerous, and he has the kids with him. This trip is Tim’s first time flying since his parents died on a plane.</p>
<p>He’ll be there as soon as he can, but he doesn’t know when that will be. A few days, probably.</p>
<p>They run the DNA test again, just in case. They watch the news as bodies continue to pile up. All criminals. All the worst criminals. Jim lights the Bat signal, and Dick, the only Bat on the continent, ignores it. Don’t engage, Bruce said, and for once he isn't tempted to disobey. He’s not fighting his little brother.</p>
<p>They spend the night and most of the next day searching for Jason’s missing year, searching for some explanation, and coming up with nothing. Dick and Babs pass out on the couch. Alfred wakes them in the morning, and they turn on the TV to find Roman Sionis dead and the Red Hood rapidly filling the resulting power vacuum.</p>
<p>Less than a month behind the scenes, less than a week front-and-center, and Jason Todd is running Gotham’s criminal empire.</p>
<p>Dick runs the DNA again.</p>
<p>He calls Bruce as soon as the Joker’s Arkham breakout is announced. They’re about to finally board a plane. Which means Dick won’t be able to contact them again for hours.</p>
<p>Jason broadcasts a live feed of the Joker, tied and gagged in a dimly lit room. He makes a long, rambling speech about cleaning up Gotham—is that what he’s doing?—voice older than it should be, distorted by the mask.</p>
<p>He’s barely eighteen.</p>
<p>“I could probably figure out where he’s filming from,” Babs says. Dick doesn’t answer, and she makes no move to actually do so. They watch as Jason shoots the Joker between the eyes.</p>
<p>Dick picks up Bruce and the kids from the airport.</p>
<p>“How sure are you?” Bruce asks.</p>
<p>“Completely.”</p>
<p>“How many dead?”</p>
<p>“Thirty two.”</p>
<p>“Okay,” Bruce says. “Okay. We’re going to fix this.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>They’ll have to undermine his authority. He brought Gotham under his control fast. They’ll have to bring it back faster—they can’t let him keep killing people.</p>
<p>That night Bruce finds him with his gun to a drug dealer’s head.</p>
<p>“If you shoot that man you’re grounded.”</p>
<p>“What the fuck,” Jason says.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Jason is alive. His son is alive. Alive, killing dozens of people, and rapidly building a criminal empire, but, well. You can’t win them all.</p>
<p>The first thing he does is bench Tim and Cass—Jay’s already shot Dick.</p>
<p>Barbara traces Jason to an abandoned building in Crime Alley, where he’s meeting with all the major players he hasn’t killed yet. Bruce is bursting in on them before he’s worked out what to say, and they all turn to stare at him.</p>
<p>“Robin,” he says, because he can’t call him Jason and he won’t use a name that used to be his murderer’s. He doesn’t know what to say next, doesn’t have time to put much thought into it—let him know they want him home. Don’t say anything personal in front of this audience. “Dinner’s at six tomorrow. Don’t be late.”</p>
<p>He can’t fight—can’t risk hurting his son—so he leaves. Jason doesn’t come to dinner, but he doesn’t kill anyone at that meeting, either.</p>
<p>The whole family meets in the cave in the morning. Barbara hasn’t gone home since Jason appeared. She and Dick are exhausted. Alfred, too. Tim and Cass are confused—well, they’re all confused. But they need a plan.</p>
<p>They can’t hurt Jay. They can’t arrest him. They have to bring him home, find out what’s wrong with him. But they can’t fight him. Not Jay.</p>
<p>So. They’ll have to undermine his authority. He brought Gotham under his control fast. They’ll have to bring it back faster—they can’t let him keep killing people.</p>
<p>That night Bruce finds him with his gun to a drug dealer’s head.</p>
<p>“If you shoot that man you’re grounded.”</p>
<p>“What the fuck,” Jason says, and it’s the first time he’s heard his son’s voice since he died. Not his real voice, but still. Barbara’s recording of his insane speech before killing the Joker doesn’t count.</p>
<p>“I’ll ground you,” Bruce repeats. Jason stares at him. Jason’s goons—because Jason has goons now—stare at him. Jason pulls the trigger, but he’s not looking at his victim—because Jason has victims now—and it goes through his shoulder instead of his brain.</p>
<p>“No TV for a month,” Bruce says, because it’s important to follow through.</p>
<p>“Fuck you,” Jason says, and Bruce leaves. He calls an ambulance for the drug dealer before going back to the cave.</p>
<p>“We missed you at dinner, Robin,” he says next time he finds him.</p>
<p>“Don’t call me that!” Jason snaps.</p>
<p>Bruce listens to the other men in the room, whispering things like “Does Batman know him?” and “Why doesn’t he just kill him?” He leaves before Jason can decide the best way to save face is shooting him.</p>
<p>Every night, Batman acts like Red Hood’s dad. And every night, Gotham’s criminals respect Red Hood a little less. And Bruce doesn’t know what to do next. Interfering with his criminal activity is good, but Bruce wants his kid to come home. Jason is so angry—Bruce doesn’t even know what he’s angry about. Letting him die? Not finding him when he was in a coma in Gotham? Everything?</p>
<p>There’s still at least a year of missing history, and they don’t even know how he came back to life in the first place. Barbara spends every waking moment researching, and Tim helps, since he’s benched. Dick is going out as Nightwing every night, but he hasn’t gone back to work, and Bruce is afraid he’ll be fired. Cass is restless and annoyed, not allowed to patrol and not able to help with research. She watches grainy, dark videos of Jason, and says she can’t get a read on him.</p>
<p>Rumors that the Red Hood is a disgraced former Robin spread fast. He’s slipping, and there’s no one to fill the power gap—most of his competitors are dead. The Arkham crowd are quiet—Joker is gone, and that means all the rules are different. No one is taking any chances.</p>
<p>“Robin,” Bruce says, dropping down in an alley behind him.</p>
<p>Jason spins around. “Stop calling me that! I’m not Robin anymore! You fired me! You replaced me!”</p>
<p>He shoots Bruce, in what he should know is one of the most thoroughly bulletproofed parts of his suit. Then he turns around and shoots the guy he was talking to when Bruce dropped in, even though Bruce is pretty sure he’s one of Red Hood’s informants.</p>
<p>Bruce is too shocked at being shot by his son to react until Jason is out of sight. He calls an ambulance for the informant.</p>
<p>Well. At least now they have a source of anger.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>New chapter will be posted every day until story is finished. Eight chapters total, about 6,500 words. New chapter every time POV switches - we've got Dick, Bruce, and Jason.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>He should have just killed Dick as soon as he saw his face. He doesn’t know why he didn’t.</p><p>Now Bruce is trying to fucking parent him, and everything is ruined.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>He had a plan. It was a good plan—Talia even agreed.</p><p>His original plan was a lot more dramatic. It had involved a quicker reveal and Bruce killing the Joker. But he needed the Joker dead, now. And he figured if he got established first, the reveal would be more exciting when it came.</p><p>He scheduled all the big stuff for the week Bruce was going to be out of town. After orchestrating Bruce going out of town by very quietly taking control of the mob and lulling him into a false sense of security.</p><p>He was watching for Bats. He never would have made his big move if Nightwing was in town, but Nightwing wasn’t. Dick was there for his fucking day job, and Jason hadn’t been prepared for that.</p><p>He should have just killed Dick as soon as he saw his face. He doesn’t know why he didn’t.</p><p>Now Bruce is trying to fucking parent him, and everything is ruined.</p><p>At least the Joker is dead.</p><p>He would get back all of his street cred and then some if he killed Batman.</p><p>Maybe he should do that.</p><p>Yeah. Definitely. He should do that. No reason not to.</p><p>So why the hell didn’t he take a lethal shot half an hour ago?</p><p>Probably the same stupid reason he barely grazed Dick that first night, which is that Talia is right, and he’s stupid and weak and not ready, even if it was a good plan.</p><p>He’s not going to kill Bruce. Or Dick. He was going to kill the new Robin eventually, but Bruce hasn’t let him on the streets since Jason’s cover broke. And he can’t break into the manor. Alfred’s in the manor. He’s not ready to think about Alfred yet.</p><p>He wants to break something, but there’s nothing left to break. Everything in this warehouse is already broken, most of it into such tiny pieces he can’t possibly break it more.</p><p>It was a good plan.</p><p>A good plan for a sane man, Talia’s voice says in his head, but you’re a lunatic and a child.</p><p>Talia’s voice isn't one he usually hears, but it’s not any better than the others.</p><p>The warehouse itself is still in one piece. He could break that—he could blow it up.</p><p>Yeah. That’s what he’s going to do. That’ll make him feel better.</p><p>It was a good plan. He can still make it work. So Bruce is undermining his authority. So what? He doesn’t need respect from these creeps. He just needs fear. And Jason can be real scary.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>The downside of this format, with chapters split by POV, is that some chapters are real short. Sorry. Tomorrow's is much longer.</p><p>So as someone who was a mentally ill teenager not too long ago, I spent a lot of time considering if and how an 18 year old with mental/emotional health issues could run a criminal empire. I'm bipolar, and I think I could maybe take over the criminal underworld during a manic period. The first part of a manic period, when I'm hyper-competent. But the more manic I get, the less competent I get, until I can barely remember to eat or sleep. Anyway, the point is, I doubt a sick teenager's ability to maintain control over Gotham's criminal element for an extended period of time. I think he's gonna spiral out of control eventually, probably sooner rather than later.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter 4</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>He reaches up to unlatch Jason’s helmet, and Jay tries to bat his hand away.</p><p>“Stop it. You wanna blow me up?”</p><p>Bruce pauses. “You have explosives in your helmet? Around your head? Jason Peter Todd—”</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Bruce gets home and begins the painful process of analyzing the time surrounding Jason’s death.</p><p>He understands why Jason feels replaced. Tim is here. Tim is Robin, although Bruce hasn’t actually let him out as Robin since Jason reappeared. (Which is a fight he is so, so sick of having with Tim and Cassandra both.)</p><p>But fired?</p><p>Reluctantly, Bruce admits to himself that things before Jason’s death had not been good. It’s hard to think about that, hard to let any imperfections into his final days with his son.</p><p>But there had been that woman who killed herself, that rapist with diplomatic immunity. Jason had been upset. Bruce had been upset, but not like Jason. It had been personal for Jason. He’d been angry and reckless. And it hadn’t just been about that—he’d been more difficult in general, at home too. Dick had been the same way at that age, and Bruce had attributed it to puberty.</p><p>They’d had a fight not long before Jason—Bruce had benched him. Bruce had intended to bench him; Jay hadn’t been acting like himself at all, and he was worried sick. He can’t remember his exact words—did Jason think he—did he think it was permanent?</p><p>A particularly nasty exchange comes back to him, from a week or two before—he had said—did Jason think that Bruce thought that Jason killed that rapist? Because Bruce absolutely did not think that, but he’s not exactly great with words, and he’d lost his temper, and—it shouldn’t even matter, with dozens of deaths on Jason’s hands now, but it absolutely does. If Jason thought that Bruce thought—does he think he’s been kicked out of the cave, or out of the family?</p><p>Jason had gone to Ethiopia because he was an impulsive teenager who’d just discovered his birth mother and wanted to meet her. And he hadn’t told Bruce first because he was mad at him. Bruce hadn’t thought it was any more complicated than that. Had Jason been going to find his birth mother because he thought Bruce didn’t want to be his parent anymore?</p><p>He changes out of his suit and goes upstairs. Tim and Cass are awake, watching TV; he can’t convince them to go to bed before he gets home.</p><p>“Any progress?” Tim asks.</p><p>“I’m not sure.” Do the many horrible questions raised tonight count as progress?</p><p>“Why can’t we just tranq him and drag him home?”</p><p>“He already doesn’t trust us—that won’t help. And I’m not going to attack my son.”</p><p>He’s sure that would be a point of contention between him and Jim, if he had bothered to respond to the Bat signal at all since the Red Hood’s appearance. Jim must be pissed. And it can’t be helping that Bruce has practically kidnapped his daughter. Sure, Barbara is an adult who’s choosing to stay at the manor, but he’s fairly certain the only reason she hasn’t gone home in three weeks is that she doesn’t want to talk to her dad about Batman and the Red Hood.</p><p>There are criminals that Bruce feels obligated to protect. People who are desperate. People who are more sick than evil. None of those people are the ones Jason is targeting. He doesn’t love that Jason is murdering mob bosses and pedophiles, but repairing his relationship with his son is much more important that saving their lives.</p><p>Isn't it?</p><p>Bruce doesn’t know what to do. Jason’s behavior grows increasing erratic over the next several days. He blows up a number of abandoned buildings, including the warehouse Dick said he was living in. He shoots several petty criminals (non-fatally, at least) for no apparent reason. He becomes more prone to long, rambling speeches, frequently punctuated with un-aimed gunfire.</p><p>One night, Bruce finds him leading some sort of meeting with his remaining goons. He’s stiff, stumbling a little, and he looks slightly thinner than he did last night. He keeps losing his train of thought and restarting his speech.</p><p>Bruce is fairly certain Jason’s seen him, but he doesn’t interfere, waiting until the goons have cleared out to drop to the ground.</p><p>As he suspected, Jason looks thinner because he’s not wearing any body armor, just his leather jacket and a black t-shirt.</p><p>“What do you want?” Jason asks.</p><p>“I want to make sure you’re okay.” He’s not okay—he’s shaking. And then there’s the murder.</p><p>“’M fine. Leave me alone. You’re not my dad anymore.”</p><p>“I’ll always be your dad, Jay.”</p><p>He stumbles again, and Bruce catches him; his hand is bloody when he pulls away.</p><p>“Shit.”  Bruce lifts Jason’s flimsy t-shirt—where the hell is his armor?—revealing an oozing bullet hole and a faded autopsy scar. Jason doesn’t fight him like he’s expecting, but then he’s probably lost a lot of blood.</p><p>“Jay, what did you—”</p><p>“Pit can’t fix everything,” Jason says—he must think for some reason that Bruce is asking about the scar instead of the actively bleeding wound.</p><p>The pit—the Lazarus Pit? Is that how he’s—</p><p>It doesn’t matter. This isn't the time. He reaches up to unlatch Jason’s helmet, and Jay tries to bat his hand away.</p><p>“Stop it. You wanna blow me up?”</p><p>Bruce pauses. “You have explosives in your helmet? Around your head? Jason Peter Todd—”</p><p>Jay reaches up and unlatches the helmet himself; Bruce takes it and sets it very carefully on the ground. It’s the first time he’s seen his son’s face since he was—he’s pale and sweaty, eyes bloodshot.</p><p>“Come on, Jay. We have to get that bullet wound taken care of.”</p><p>Jason tries to push him away. “Can’t go with you. Don’t wanna go to Arkham.” </p><p>It’s the first time Bruce has heard his voice, unmodified by the helmet, and it takes a moment to register what he’s actually saying.</p><p>“Arkham? Why would I take you to Arkham?”</p><p>Jay is getting paler by the second—Bruce is pretty sure he’s going to pass out soon. But it’s the most he’s talked to him since coming back.</p><p>“They said you’d take me to Arkham.”</p><p>“Who? Who said that, Jay?”</p><p>He frowns. “Talia?” he suggests. “No. Ra’s? Joker? I think it was Joker. Before I shot him.”</p><p>“Jay, I would never—”</p><p>He finally passes out before Bruce can finish. And, well. Bruce isn't prepared to render his son unconscious, no matter how impatient Tim is, but once his son has rendered himself unconscious through poor life choices, he has no problem taking advantage of the opportunity to bring him home. Besides, there’s nowhere else to take him—Jason blew up his last known residence.</p><p>He puts Jason in the passenger seat of the Batmobile, and his helmet, carefully wrapped in padding material, in the trunk.</p><p>Explosive headgear. That’s even worse than going out without body armor.</p><p>Alfred helps pull the bullet out of Jason while Dick goes upstairs and changes the sheets on his bed, untouched for three years. Jay has a dozen other injuries, including three cracked ribs. He’s badly dehydrated, and based on the bump on the back of his head, probably concussed. They administer a sedative and set up IV fluids. He’ll be asleep for five hours, at least.</p><p>Bruce carries him upstairs, tucks him in, and goes to call Talia.</p><p>She answers on the second ring. “What?” she snaps. She sounds frazzled—he’s never heard her sound frazzled—and there’s a child crying in the background.</p><p>“What did you do to my son?”</p><p>“Which one?”</p><p>“Which—Jason, Talia. What did you do to Jason?”</p><p>“Fed and clothed him for a year, then talked him out of an insane plan to kill you after forcing you to kill the Joker. You’re welcome.”</p><p>“Did you put him in a Lazarus Pit?”</p><p>“Well, nothing else was working.”</p><p>“Working for what?”</p><p>“For—” Her voice changes, goes soft and lilting. “Yes, sweetheart, I know it hurts. Don’t cry. Everything is fine. Everything will be fine.”</p><p>“Talia!”</p><p>“I don’t have time for this, Bruce.”</p><p>“What could possibly be more important than my son?”</p><p>Talia laughs, slightly hysterical. The child is still crying, not quite as hard as before. “Well, the good news is you have another son. The bad news is my father just broke his arm. The other bad news is now that I’ve corrupted the Pit with worthless street trash, he’s going to need to transfer his essence into Damian’s body when he comes of age. So I need to team up with my insane sister to kill my father permanently, and I’m a little busy right now.”</p><p>“I have—”</p><p>“I’ll bring him to meet you when Father’s dead. You can handle Jason, Bruce. Just make sure he’s taking his meds.”</p><p>“What meds? Talia—”</p><p>But she’s hung up on him. He calls back five times and doesn’t get an answer.</p><p>She said—that crying child is probably his son. He has another son. He must be, what—three? Four? When was the last time he and Talia had—Ra’s al Ghul broke his son’s arm. Ra’s al Ghul thinks his son corrupted the fucking Lazarus Pit instead of the other way around. Ra’s al Ghul wants to transfer his essence—Talia’s got this. Bruce can’t do anything about any of that right now. He needs to take care of Jason. If he hasn’t heard from Talia by the time that’s handled, he’ll go looking for her. For now, Jason is the priority.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Chapter 5</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>“I would never send you to Arkham, Jason. I don’t know what the Joker or fucking Talia and Ra’s told you, but I wouldn’t—that would never happen.”</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Jason wakes up in a bed, which makes no sense, because he hasn’t slept in an actual bed in at least a month—warehouses do not come furnished.</p>
<p>The first thing he sees when he opens his eyes is the signed poster Bruce got him at that baseball game. The second thing he sees is a completely unfamiliar girl. She smiles at him.</p>
<p>“Get Bruce,” she says.</p>
<p>“What?”</p>
<p>And she’s out the door, probably to tell Bruce he’s awake.</p>
<p>There’s a new Batgirl, too. This must be her.</p>
<p>He can’t see Bruce right now. He needs—he needs to think, first. He needs a new plan.</p>
<p>He stands, not realizing there’s an IV in his arm until the motion pulls it out.</p>
<p>It fucking hurts.</p>
<p>He closes and locks the door. Not good enough. He tries to push the bookcase in front of the door, but it’s too heavy—perfect.</p>
<p>He pulls the books out, pushes the shelf over, and puts all the books back. He shoves the desk and chair in front of the door, too. </p>
<p>He’s much more tired than he should be, and when he looks down he’s bleeding.</p>
<p>Right. The gunshot. Someone must have patched him up. And now he’s ripped the stitches. He gets back into bed slowly.</p>
<p>It’s not long before there’s a knock on his door.</p>
<p>“Can I come in?” Bruce asks.</p>
<p>“No.”</p>
<p>He tries to turn the knob anyway, of course, then sighs. “You know I have a key, right?”</p>
<p>“Try it, asshole.”</p>
<p>Bruce sighs again. “Did you block the door?”</p>
<p>Jason doesn’t answer.</p>
<p>“Did you rip your stitches?”</p>
<p>“It’s fine.”</p>
<p>“Dammit, Jay. I just want to talk to you.”</p>
<p>“Then talk.”</p>
<p>“I would never send you to Arkham, Jason. I don’t know what the Joker or fucking Talia and Ra’s told you, but I wouldn’t—that would never happen.”</p>
<p>Jason doesn’t answer.</p>
<p>“Um. I called Talia. She said—is there some sort of medication you need to be taking?”</p>
<p>Oh. Fuck. Is that why he’s been feeling like shit all week? “I blew it up. I mean, it was in the warehouse I blew up. The first one. Um. The first one this week.”</p>
<p>“I’ll get you more. What is it?”</p>
<p>“I, uh, don’t remember.”</p>
<p>“We’ll go through the rubble, see if we can find the bottle or something. If you’re not going to open the door, will you reinsert the IV line? You’re extremely dehydrated.”</p>
<p>“Fine.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Chapter 6</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>“How should I be acting?”</p><p>“Like I’m a dangerous criminal.”</p><p>“You’re my little brother. I don’t care what else you are. Now quit squirming.”</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Dick takes Bruce back to the warehouse where he first found Jason, and they spend a couple hours sifting through the rubble before Babs calls him.</p><p>“Why didn’t you idiots tell me what you were doing? I found the drug, I called Leslie, and you can pick up the prescription in half an hour.”</p><p>“Thanks, Babs. How’s Jay?”</p><p>“Either ignoring everyone or a really sound sleeper. I tried to talk to him few times, but no luck. I’m—um, I’m going to head home tonight. Since the Red Hood issue is resolved for now. I’ll come back when he’s ready to talk to me, okay?”</p><p>Dick sends Bruce home, because he hasn’t slept since bringing Jason back. He picks up the meds from Leslie, then goes home and climbs through Jason’s window.</p><p>He’s asleep, doesn’t even move when Dick comes in. Dick sets the meds and the water bottle he brought on the nightstand. All the other furniture, except for the bed, is shoved up against the door. Dick think about moving it, so Bruce can get in, but Jason doesn’t want Bruce to get in. And rearranging the furniture would probably wake him up.</p><p>Dick’s got bandages and sutures and painkillers in his pockets, but that’ll have to wait a bit. He doesn’t want to wake Jay. Not yet. He sits down on the floor in the corner and pulls out his phone. He has to text Tim and Cass, make sure they keep Bruce in bed for at least a couple hours—he needs to be well-rested to be level-headed, and he needs to be level-headed to deal with Jason.</p><p>He’s just considering going back through the window and coming back later when Jay finally starts to move around.</p><p>“Fuck,” he says after a few minutes. “I thought maybe it was a nightmare.”</p><p>“Right,” Dick says. “I also have nightmares about finally being safe at home after dying, coming back, and going on a killing spree.”</p><p>He sighs. “Hi, Dick.”</p><p>“Hey, Jay. I’m gonna turn on the lights, okay? I’ve got sutures—Bruce says you ripped your stitches.”</p><p>“You come in through the window?”</p><p>“Yep.” He flips the light switch. </p><p>“I forgot to lock it.”</p><p>“You did. Come on, sit up. I can take out the IV, too, but you have to drink the water I brought. And take the painkillers. And your meds—Babs tracked them down.”</p><p>Jason sits up slowly, wincing. Dick pulls the supplies out of his pockets, and hands Jay the water bottle.</p><p>“Two pills,” he says.</p><p>“What are they?”</p><p>“The same thing Talia gave you.”</p><p>Jay just looks at him.</p><p>“Seriously? You took drugs from Talia al Ghul without knowing what they did?”</p><p>“Is it bad?”</p><p>Dick sighs. “No, nothing bad. Commonly used as a mood stabilizer and antipsychotic. Take off your shirt so I can stitch you up. Careful—did you know you have broken ribs?”</p><p>“Would you stop it?”</p><p>“Stop what?”</p><p>“Acting like things are normal.”</p><p>“How should I be acting?” He starts to stitch, carefully.</p><p>“Like I’m a dangerous criminal.”</p><p>“You’re my little brother. I don’t care what else you are. Now quit squirming.”</p><p>He glowers at Dick, and refuses to say anything else. But he lets Dick stitch him up, and he takes the meds and drinks the water. Then Dick just has to wait.</p><p>“Shit,” Jason says, about half an hour later.</p><p>“You have to pee, don’t you?”</p><p>“I hate you.”</p><p>“Uh huh. Hang on, I’ll unblock the door.”</p><p>It takes a while—Jay’s bookshelf is really heavy. He ends up having to pull most of the books off the shelf and pile them on the floor.</p><p>The kids must have actually gotten Bruce to sleep, because they get down the hall and back without encountering anyone. Dick makes sure to get back into the bedroom before Jay, so he can’t lock him out.</p><p>“Tim wanted me to tell you he’ll give Robin back.”</p><p>“What? That’s not his call. Bruce is the one who—”</p><p>“Benched you because you were acting reckless and erratic? Kinda like you are right now? You’re not going out as anyone for a few months, at least. You have—shit. I almost forgot. Gotta check you for concussion.”</p><p>And he’s definitely concussed.</p><p>“Okay. You need to rest. If you go out the window, you’ll rip your stitches again. If you go out the door, you’ll run into someone in the hallway. And either way, you’ll have to walk all the way back to the city. So just stay here, okay?”</p><p>“So I’m a prisoner.”</p><p>“No, you’re an invalid. Also you’re grounded.”</p><p>“And what’s the difference between being a prisoner and being grounded?”</p><p>“The difference is we love you.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Chapter 7</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>“You hate messes.” Bruce frowns. “Although you’ve been making an awful lot of them lately. You wanna tell me what’s up with that?”</p>
<p>“Not making messes. Cleaning them up.”</p>
<p>“Well, gunfire is an interesting janitorial strategy, but, um, let’s come back to that, okay?</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Bruce sleeps better than he has in a long time, knowing Jay is down the hall where he belongs.</p>
<p>Everything is going to be okay now.</p>
<p>Tim and Cass can patrol tonight—Dick will go with them. Bruce isn't leaving this house until he’s on good terms with Jason. He’s going to find out exactly where Jason’s been and what’s happened to him. He’s going to make sure Jay knows how much he loves him, and he’s going to make him stop killing people. And then he’s going to file the paperwork he’s already filled out to bring him legally back to life.</p>
<p>The door isn't locked this time, and Bruce lets himself in quietly. Jay is sleeping. Most of his books are in stacks on the floor, so Bruce sits down and starts re-shelving them. Jason likes his books sorted alphabetically by author, except for nonfiction, which goes on the bottom shelf in order of subject, and his favorites, which go on the top shelf in order of how much he loves them. Bruce is trying to remember the order the last three top-shelf books go in when he hears Jason sit up.</p>
<p>“How’re you feeling, Jay?”</p>
<p>“Like I should have locked that fucking window.”</p>
<p>Bruce figures out the next book, then holds up the remaining two. “Which of these do you like better?”</p>
<p>“What? Why?”</p>
<p>“I’m putting your books away.”</p>
<p>“Why?” he asks again.</p>
<p>“Because you hate messes.” Bruce frowns. “Although you’ve been making an awful lot of them lately. You wanna tell me what’s up with that?”</p>
<p>“Not making messes. Cleaning them up.”</p>
<p>“Well, gunfire is an interesting janitorial strategy, but, um, let’s come back to that, okay? Can you tell me what happened after you—” He can’t actually say it. “We did an autopsy.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, I sort of noticed.”</p>
<p>“Jay.”</p>
<p>“I woke up. In the coffin. It was, uh, it was a really nice coffin, B. Sturdy.”</p>
<p>“Jason,” he says, horrified.</p>
<p>“I got out, but I don’t remember much after that. Not until the Lazarus Pit. I guess I was with Talia for a while, but she had to send me away because her dad was pissed about the Pit.”</p>
<p>Bruce wants badly to ask if Jay knows about this other—about Damian—but now isn't the time. Jay’s finally talking to him. It might be because he’s concussed and on heavy painkillers, but Bruce will take what he can get.</p>
<p>“Why didn’t you just come home, Jay?”</p>
<p>“I didn’t have anywhere to come home to! You fired me!”</p>
<p>He should maybe give Jay space, but this—yeah, no. He gets up onto the bed. “Batman and Robin—and Red Hood—have nothing to do with the fact that you are my son, and I love you more than anything in the world.”</p>
<p>“More than Dick and the new kids?” he asks, because it is in Jason’s nature to always push.</p>
<p>“Exactly as much as Dick and the new kids. But it’s not—I never lost them, Jay. To watch you die, and then—”</p>
<p>“You watched me die? You were there?”</p>
<p>It’s been so long, he’d forgotten Jay didn’t—he really, really doesn’t want to talk about this. But Jason needs him to. “After you ran away, it took us a while to figure out where you’d gone. Your mo—Sheila Haywood, she was—” He does not want to tell this story, does not want to relive this. He takes a breath and starts again. “You know what she was doing?”</p>
<p>“Working with the Joker. I tried to—I wanted to help her get out of it, but she made a deal with him, traded me to—”</p>
<p>He stops abruptly, and Bruce wraps an arm around his shoulders. Jay turns his face into Bruce’s chest. “And then he killed us both,” he says, voice muffled.</p>
<p>“I was—I wasn’t far behind you. I realized what she—that the Joker was—I didn’t even take the time to put on the Batsuit, and I was still too late. Got to the building less than a minute after the explosion. You were unconscious when I found you, but not—it was two or three minutes, maybe. I carried you to—I knew an ambulance wouldn’t get there in time, but I thought maybe we could meet it on the road, and then I thought maybe I shouldn’t have moved you, but they said it wouldn’t have made any difference. I just—”</p>
<p>He looks down; Jason is crying.</p>
<p>“I love you so much, Jay. I’m so sorry I didn’t let you know that.”</p>
<p>“It was a good plan,” Jay mumbles, several minutes later. “Talia said so.”</p>
<p>“What was the plan, exactly?”</p>
<p>“I was gonna kill all the really bad people in Gotham, and make sure everyone else was too scared of me to ever take their places. I mean, it was more complicated—I had a lot of steps. But that was, you know. The end goal.”</p>
<p>It’s an enormous relief that this plan seems to be in the past tense. “How were you going to decide who was really bad?”</p>
<p>“It was, um, like rapists and murderers and repeat offenders who just kept getting away with it again and again.”</p>
<p>“What were you thinking about the part with the murderers, where you were also—”</p>
<p>“Oh, well, I figure there are a lot of bad people to get through in Gotham, but if I ever killed them all, I could kill myself after that.”</p>
<p>“Jason.”</p>
<p>“I, uh, I didn’t tell Talia that part of the plan? I figured that was a few years out, at least.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, that plan is cancelled. And you’re not fired, by the way. I was worried about you, and I handled it badly. I’m still worried. And you’re not fired, but you are extremely grounded. And you have a lot of injuries to recover from. So we have time to figure everything out. Okay?”</p>
<p>“Okay,” Jason says. “Okay. We have time.”</p>
<p>“Good.” Bruce leans down, intending to kiss his forehead, but changes his mind when he runs a hand through his hair. “Okay. Now, you need a shower. Then we should go downstairs, get you some food. Maybe watch a movie.”</p>
<p>Jason looks down, picking at the fabric of his bedspread. “I’m, um, I’m not sure I’m ready to go downstairs.”</p>
<p>“Why not?”</p>
<p>“Don’t wanna meet the new kids yet,” he mumbles.</p>
<p>“They have been desperate to patrol for days now. I’m sure they’re out there already.”</p>
<p>“Oh. Okay.”</p>
<p>“So. Shower?”</p>
<p>He nods. “Shower.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Just one more (really short) chapter left!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Chapter 8</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>His dad loves him. And everything is going to be okay. Jason is home.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Okay, so just one last itty bitty chapter to wrap things up from Jason's POV. I'm sorry I made you guys wait intil so much later in the day than usual for less than 300 words; today kind of got away from me.</p>
<p>Thank you so much for reading this story, and I hope you've enjoyed it!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Alfred makes him soup and hugs him and says how good it is to have him home. He doesn’t say anything about the last month, except for warning him not to rip his stitches again.</p>
<p>He sits on the couch, and Bruce sets up the TV. Jay doesn’t care what they watch—he hasn’t seen many movies in the last three years, and he thinks he’ll probably fall asleep, anyway. He still feels sort of terrible. He’s not sure if that’s from the concussion, or the gunshot, or the broken ribs, or skipping his meds for a week, or just from the conversation they just had. Maybe all of it.</p>
<p>Things are still weird, and hard, and they probably will be for a while. He still has two new siblings to meet, one of whom he was planning to kill. He still needs to admit that plan to Bruce. He’s not quite sure who he is or what he wants anymore, and everything is kind of a mess right now. </p>
<p>But his dad is coming to sit next to him, taking away his empty bowl and kissing him on the top of his head like Jay didn’t shoot him a week ago. His dad loves him. And everything is going to be okay. Jason is home.</p>
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